


Beggars Would Ride

by seekeronthepath



Category: Labyrinth (1986)
Genre: Fae & Fairies, Goblins, how the goblin king is chosen, sarah dreams of the labyrinth
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-24
Updated: 2014-12-24
Packaged: 2018-03-03 06:19:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,487
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2841125
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/seekeronthepath/pseuds/seekeronthepath
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Every thirteen nights she dreamt of the Labyrinth, for thirteen years. And at last she dreamt that she stood at the door of the Castle, and the Goblin King was before her.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Beggars Would Ride

She aged faster now, or so she thought. It was difficult to say. But she thought that she visited the Labyrinth in her dreams, and lived there longer than she slept, and when she woke, she was older. She would meet her friends - go questing with Didymus and Ambrosius, or watch rocks dance to Ludo's singing, or learn the labyrinth's paths with Hoggle. She'd taken tea with the worm and his missus now, in a chamber that fit her perfectly even though it was just their size. And she'd taken the rings from the door-knockers and talked to them for hours. She'd brought trinkets to the ones who collected children's treasures, and shown her worlds of precious things. She'd watched from afar as the head-swappers danced. She'd met the creatures that lived under the paving stones. Every thirteenth night, for almost thirteen years, she had dreamed of the Labyrinth, and not once had she met the Goblin King there.

 

She'd asked about him, in a roundabout way. Was he always the Goblin King? Who came before him? How did the title pass from one to the other? Why did he look human when no-one else did? The crystals, and the owl - were those _his_ powers, or part of the kingship, or were the two one and the same? Why had he, _they_ , been listening when she wished, and why had he answered? Sometimes they told her true, she thought, and sometimes lies, and sometimes nothing at all. But she thought she knew, now, what he was.

 

A child is wished to the goblins, and the goblins take him. They keep him until he is taken back, or the time is up. The changeling, if they are not claimed free, grows in the care of the Goblin King, grows with the power of human wishes, human stubbornness that bends the changeable world of the Labyrinth around them. If they are clever and cunning, they can change it so much that it changes their very self - into an owl, perhaps. And when the child is grown...no-one would tell her that, what happened to a Goblin King when a changeling child was grown. Did a Goblin King become fey after too many years in the Labyrinth? Become yet another creature that roamed its paths, a seer or a riddler or a keeper of precious things? Was the ballroom she had visited full of older Kings, trapped in dreaming? Had they simply died? No-one told her, but she wondered.

 

By day, she was a school-child, then a college student, then a writer. She wrote picture-books and children's stories, tales of the Labyrinth, mostly. Curious, captivating tales, of wishes and riddles and goblins and dreams. They sold well, but not too well, and so she kept herself, a young woman, but not so young as she seemed. Her brother grew, no longer changeling, and if he dreamt of the Labyrinth he never said, though she wondered. She told him her stories first, cautionary tales. If he _were_ to return to the Labyrinth, to be touched once more by the Goblin Realm, she wished him to know what to do, as she had not. Be polite, she told him, speak carefully. Ask questions, even if the answers make no sense. All is not as it seems. Make friends. Life isn't fair. Always take time for tea.

 

Every thirteen nights she dreamt of the Labyrinth, for thirteen years. And at last she dreamt that she stood at the door of the Castle, and the Goblin King was before her.

"Hello, Sarah," he said. Was he older? She could not tell.

"Hello, Jareth," she replied. A message: _I shall not call you king. You have no power over me_.

"I have been hearing tales about you."

"And I about you. Tell me, if you would: who wished you away?"

He looked at her sharply, a frowning look, and intrigued. "My mother. She did not look for me."

"Do you wish she had?" Would Toby have been better off a changeling? He was loved as a human child, but would _he_ have loved the Labyrinth?

"I would have thought, my dear, that you had learnt to be careful about wishes." He smiled then, one of his sardonic smiles that said nothing at all.

"Have you heard one from me since?" She knew he had not. She did not wish, now. He nodded his acknowledgement. "Why am I at the Castle tonight?" She kept her voice calm, non-confrontational.

"There have been no changelings since you won," he pointed out. She had known already: her friends would have told her if there was a new babe, a new seeker. "Instead, _you_ have been here, in your dreaming."

"I have noticed that I am here rather longer than I am truly asleep," she said. "Was that your doing?"

"So and not so," he said. "It is my skill, but the Labyrinth's power, and the goblin's wishes."

"Is it your task to grant their wishes?" she asked.

"It is my fealty to them, as the magic is theirs to me. They are the flesh and blood of the Labyrinth, the heart of the Labyrinth, but the Goblin King is its bones." That was more straightforward than almost anything she had heard. But what about the King made them the bones? What about bones was essential?

"You provide...structure? Foundation? Something to pull against?"

"Indeed." He was smiling again.

 

She thought back a moment. "The...Labyrinth wants me here? And the goblins?"

He stood, and moved to stand at the window, hands behind his back. "The Labyrinth is old, Sarah, old beyond knowing. And since its beginning, there has always been a Goblin King, male or female as it suits. A Goblin King cannot rule forever, and there have been many of us, dozens of changelings. In all that time," and now he turned to look at her again, "three seekers have succeeded."

She inhaled suddenly, taken aback at the thought. Oh, she'd asked after the changelings, she'd asked after the seekers, and she'd heard of failure after failure. But only three babes reclaimed?

"You traded more for Toby than you thought, Sarah. The Labyrinth sought a child, and found one, and you took him away. To the Labyrinth, you stand in his place."

"I'm the next Goblin King?" she asked, still shocked at the thought.

"Perhaps. Seekers are...special, or so the stories say. But there will be no new changelings until you succeed or fail. The Labyrinth is waiting to see what you do." There it was again. 'The Labyrinth' wants, waits, seeks, finds. The goblins spoke like that too, sometimes, in hushed voices. She was beginning to think that it was far more literal than she had assumed. Fool that she was. Almost the first thing she had learned, so many years ago - make no assumptions.

"What do you mean by...succeed? Or fail, for that matter?"

"You will replace me as Goblin King, or you will lose the Labyrinth." Oh, Jareth would forever be obscure. There was always more to his words than there seemed. "I suggest you ask your friend Hoggle."

"Hoggle?" He was knowing, yes, but...how much had he kept secret, over the years?

"He is older than he looks. Now that I have spoken to you a second time, you will find that the goblins have far more stories to tell you." He pulled crystals from the air and danced them across his fingers, watching them for something she could not see.

 

"Is there a...special significance to my speaking to you again?" Thirteen years of dreaming every thirteenth night - it was not chance.

"The first time you spoke to me after you claimed your brother, the Labyrinth knew you. You might have been my Queen, or my student then, but you refused my power. You speak to me now, for the second time, as one who knows the Labyrinth and freely walks its paths. The third time you speak to me, you will either claim the Labyrinth or you will not." His voice grew soft as he watched the crystals dance. "I...am fond of you, Sarah, so I will give you this advice. It will be better for you if you learn how to shape the Labyrinth by the time you meet me next."

Learn to shape the Labyrinth. No small task. But if he spoke true (and in the Labyrinth, few lied), then the goblins would speak to her more, now. Perhaps they would tell her how.  "Thank you, Jareth. You have...explained a lot to me tonight."

He inclined his head towards her, a regal acknowledgement. "Farewell then, Sarah, until next we meet."

She bowed back. "Farewell, Jareth."

 

The next night, she dreamt of the Labyrinth again. _My path will take me to Hoggle_ , she thought firmly, and she thought she felt the stones shiver beneath her feet.


End file.
